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Key Takeaways
- An outage across several major cellphone and wireless providers including AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile affected thousands of users on Thursday.
- AT&T was the worst-affected, with nearly 74,000 outages detected early in the day by a tracking service, while Verizon was reported to have had more than 4,300 downtime incidents.
- The cellular network problems also hampered emergency service calls across the country.
- AT&T said it was "working urgently" to restore normal service.
A widespread outage starting early Thursday affected thousands of cell phone customers of AT&T Inc. (T), T-Mobile US Inc., (TMUS), and Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ), sending shares lower.
AT&T responded to the incident with a banner on its homepage saying that some customers were experiencing wireless service disruptions and that the company was "working urgently" to restore normal service.
AT&T service was restored at 2:10 p.m. Central time and by late evening the company said the outage was likely caused by the "the application and execution of an incorrect process used as we were expanding our network, not a cyber attack."
Outage tracker DownDetector reported that AT&T had experienced nearly 74,000 incidents by 9:30 a.m. ET. Competitors Verizon and T-Mobile had more than 4,300 and 2,000 outages, respectively.
T-Mobile said its network did not experience an outage and was "operating normally," adding that the issues reported on DownDetector were "likely reflecting challenges our customers were having attempting to connect to users on other networks."
The outage also blocked calls to 911 emergency services, with many users on X reporting issues in major cities, including San Francisco. "We are aware of an issue impacting AT&T wireless customers from making and receiving any phone calls (including to 911)," the San Francisco Fire Department posted on social media platform X early Thursday. The department advised affected users to report incidents by landline.
The outage also spurred other local government statements, with Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens saying city employees could make and receive 911 calls, but authorities knew many AT&T customers couldn't. U.S. Sen. Rick Scott (R-Florida) posted on X that he had approached AT&T to discuss the outages.
"Florida law enforcement is doing everything it can to keep people safe, and I expect AT&T to keep us informed on what it is doing to get 911 services fully back online ASAP," he posted on social media.
AT&T shares were down 2.4% at $16.60 as of about 3 p.m. ET Thursday, while Verizon was 1.2% lower at $40.61 and T-Mobile was off 0.1% at $163.93.
(Update—Feb. 22, 2024: This story was updated to include AT&T service updates and comments from T-Mobile.)